The Passenger
by Ruuger
Summary: Oz is sitting in a crowded web café in a small tourist town somewhere on the coast of Thailand when he finds out that Tara is dead.


Oz is sitting in a crowded web café in a small tourist town somewhere on the coast of Thailand when he finds out that Tara is dead. 

It catches his eye as soon he logs on to his email, the short and to the point subject line "Tara is dead", waiting between "We cure any deseese!" and "If you have always dreamed of being called a sex machine", and for a moment he hopes that it's just some morbidly random spam message.

His hope dies when he sees the sender.

The message is from Xander and dated weeks ago, just a few short lines full of typos and lacking capital letters, something about nerds and the end of the world, and in the end the words:

_she needs you_

Less than an hour later he's on a bus to the airport with an e-ticket for the first available flight to States.

Oz is sitting in a crowded web café at the Los Angeles International Airport when he finds out that Willow is no longer in Sunnydale.

The message is from Xander again. Longer and less rushed, something about Giles and England, about witches and covens and peace. Oz stares at the screen for a long time before logging out without replying.

He's known all along that if he stopped to think even for a second, he wouldn't be able to go through with it. There were no etiquette rules for situations like these, no Hallmark cards for the event of your ex-girlfriend trying to end the world after the death of her lesbian lover, and he has no idea what to say to her when he sees her.

They kept in touch after Sunnydale, but along the years her rambling emails have become fewer and farther between until their correspondence became limited to holidays, deaths and resurrections.

For a moment he wonders how much a ticket to England would cost, but eventually decides to head towards Sunnydale, hoping that she will someday come back home too. Because Sunnydale is where they knew each other, where it all happened - both the good and the bad - and he's afraid that if they met on neutral ground, there would be nothing between them anymore.

He rents a car from the airport, picking the cheapest one they have, but feeling like a traitor anyway, and then stops at the first diner he spots to try to call Xander. The phone rings more than fifteen times before anyone picks up and man who answers only tells him that Xander moved out long time ago, then drunkenly mutters something about the cost of flowers before hanging up. Oz leaves the booth without even thinking about calling Willow's parents or Buffy.

He waits at the diner until nightfall. It's the night of the full moon and he doesn't want to risk losing control of the wolf, knowing that it's easier to control when he's awake. Willow may be on another continent, but the mere thought of her is enough to make the beast restless.

---------

Somewhere between the last gas station and the Sunnydale city limits, Oz suddenly notices a hitch-hiker on the side of the road. The man isn't hitch-hiking as such, just walking tiredly down the road, looking straight ahead as if didn't even notice the approaching car, but Oz supposes he must be looking for a ride because no sane man would try to cross the desert walking.

He soon catches up with the man, slows down to a crawl and rolls down the window.

"You need a ride?"

He realizes his mistake as soon as the words are out of his mouth. It has been ages since he has last seen a vampire, but their smell is something he knew he would never forget - dry death and old blood, too faint for humans to sense but a bright red warning flag for a werewolf.

The vampire turns to him and smiles.

"Well. If it isn't Jo-Jo the Dogface Boy."

Spike. The same sneer and quirked eyebrow that Oz remembered from the few times he had met the vampire; the same predator's aura even though the leather was gone and the peroxied hair had grown long and shaggy. Spike senses his fear and his smile widens.

"Shouldn't be picking up hitch-hikers at this hour. Never know what kind of nasties you might meet."

Oz reaches for the stake he still always keeps within reach, but Spike just laughs and gives him an odd little salute before continuing to walk down the road as if nothing had happened. Oz stares after him for a moment before making his decision.

He catches up with Spike again and opens the door.

"Do you still have the chip?"

Spike frowns and absentmindedly touches the back of his head before answering.

"Yeah."

"Then get in."

Oz isn't quite sure why he does it. Because Spike had helped rescue him from the Initiative, perhaps, or because they shared a bond born out of monsters and needles and labcoats. Or perhaps just because it's the right thing to do, because he knows Spike would never be able to cross the desert by foot before sunrise, because even monsters like him deserve some mercy.

Besides, Spike is thinner than Oz remembered. Smaller. Older. Tired. And when he steps into the car, Oz can smell rats and dirt and burnt flesh.

"Sunnydale?" he asks, and Spike just nods, staring into the rear view mirror so intently that Oz feels the urge to look behind him to make sure that there isn't someone sitting on the back seat.

The back seat is empty

(he checks, first through the mirror and then with a quick glance over his shoulder, just in case)

and eventually Spike settles down, leaning his head to the window as if he was too tired to support it otherwise.

"You off to see the witch, Toto?"

Spike doesn't look at him when he speaks, his eyes riveted to the darkness outside the window.

"In a way, yeah. You?"

"Don't need to see the wizard, already got what I wanted. A heart, a brain, a bit of courage."

When he laughs at his own joke, the sound is bitter and hollow. "Seem to have misplaced the brain somewhere on the way, though."

He sighs and buries his face to his hands.

"Now I'm back to make my amends."

"Willow told me what you did."

The expression on Spike's face when he looks up is something between horror and guilt.

"She told me you helped them rescue me from the Initiative, but she also told me that you'd only done it because you were working for Adam."

For a moment Spike stares at Oz as if he was the one not making any sense, before breaking into desperate laughter.

"Done much worse, Toto," he finally sighs, casting a quick glance at the rearview mirror before turning his face back to the window.

--------

"Home, sweet home," Spike mutters when they finally pass the Welcome to Sunnydale sign, but the further they drive into the town, the less like a home it feels to Oz.

The streets are the same, but the buildings have changed. Oz is not surprised, not in a town that has been built on both a fault line and a hellmouth,

("Got burned by a dragon," Spike supplies when they pass one particular building, then "Wrecked by a magical earthquake," pointing at another.)

but it is still disconcerting, and he finds himself desperately looking for landmarks he can recognize, anything that would prove that he had really once lived there.

He is suddenly roused from his thoughts by Spike's voice telling him to stop the car, and before he has time to react, the vampire has already yanked the door open and jumped out of the moving car.

Oz recognizes the neighborhood where they are. Across the street is what is left of the magic shop, the one where Willow always bought her ingredients and which had gone through many owners in the time that Oz had lived in Sunnydale. Spike had killed at least one of the owners, and Oz wonders if that is why the vampire is now scanning the ruins, peering through the broken and blackened windows as if looking for something.

Curiosity is not a survival trait in Sunnydale, but Oz is tempted to walk to Spike and ask him what he expects to see in the windows.

He doesn't, though, and just studies the building until the burnt letters on the facade catch his eye - MAG C OX with the B hanging upside down - and a sudden chill runs though his spine.

Just then Spike returns, looking even more tired than before, muttering quietly to himself, and not for the first time Oz wonders if the chip had done something to his brain.

"Was that Giles' shop?" he tries asking and Spike looks startled as if he had forgotten that Oz was in the car too.

"Was," Spike finally answers, rubbing his hand across his face. "He left the shop to the demon girl and buggered off to Merry Old the moment things started getting rough." He sighs. "'course, should have probably done the same thing myself. Would have been better for all if I had."

"Do you know what happened here?"

He needs to ask it even though he has a bad feeling that he already knows the answer.

_she tried to end the world_

"Dunno," Spike shrugs, staring at his own hands. "Haven't been here since spring. Don't think anyone died here, though. Couldn't smell blood, not enough at least. Buffy, Giles, Willow, Anya - could smell a bit from each, but not enough to kill."

Spike glances at the shop again.

"Dawn used to help Anya sometimes, too, but I couldn't smell her either."

He notices the confusion on Oz's face and continues with a slow voice as if talking to a child.

"Dawn, Buffy's sister," he explains and Oz almost corrects him, almost tells him that Buffy doesn't have a sister. He doesn't, though, because of course she she does, and he can't understand why he would have thought that she didn't.

-------

Oz doesn't know where they are going.

He didn't really have a plan on what to do after he arrived to Sunnydale apart from meeting up with the old gang. From Spike he has learned that Xander and Anya have broken up, Giles is in England

(with Willow, Oz automatically adds in his mind)

and Buffy has quit college and is working at Doublemeat Palace.

Oz can't think of any place to go - there is no more highscool library, no more Giles' living room, no university cafeteria or Xander's basement where they would all be hanging out. It's like the whole world has moved on, leaving him behind.

Spike is just telling him about Xander and Anya's wedding when the vampire suddenly falls quiet in mid-sentence, tilting his head and frowning as if listening to someone.

When he speaks again, it is not to Oz, but to the empty air next to him.

"Yeah, all right," he says, then turns to Oz. "Thanks for the ride, mate. You can drop me off here."

His left hand searching for the stake, Oz stops the car to let Spike out, then cuts the engine and follows the vampire to see where he's going.

It takes him a while to realize where they are, on the plot that had still held the ruins of the old high school when Oz had last visited Sunnydale.

He follows Spike to the main doors of the new school building occupying the lot, falling well behind not to disturb the vampire, but close enough to see what's going on.

Spike stops when he reaches the door, his eyes darting nervously back and forth as if he was looking for someone, then wraps his arms around himself in an oddly defensive gesture. For a few minutes he simply stands still - hugging himself with his head bowed down - but just as Oz is about to leave, he suddenly looks up and smiles.

"I didn't think you'd come.," he says, talking to someone Oz can't see. "Thought that I'd just imagined the whole thing, haven't been able to think proper since... can't sometimes tell what's real and what's just inside my head."

Spike's voice is so low and quiet that Oz has to strain his ears to make sense of his words, and when he takes a step closer to get a better look, Spike casts him a glance with a quizzical look on his face before continuing to talk to his invisible friend.

"It's the wolfboy. Oz. You know him."

There is no answer that Oz can hear, but when he looks at the shadows again, he can suddenly make out a figure standing there: Buffy, dressed in all white, making Oz wonder why he hadn't noticed her before.

He is about to greet her but stops in his tracks when she turns her attention from Spike to him. Spike is still talking to her

("Yeah, yeah, I can do that. You know I'd do anything for you. You know I love you.")

even though she hasn't said a word in reply, and only stands there quietly with her arms folded across her chest. When she looks at Oz there is an odd expression on her face, a slightly puzzled look as if she had never seen him before, and it must be a trick of the light because for a fraction of a second it isn't Buffy who is looking at him, but Veruca.

She studies him for a few more seconds without the slightest flicker of recognition, then turns away.

Spike too has finally fallen quiet and stands by the wall, his eyes still downcast. Buffy leans closer, whispering something to his ear, her hand ghosting on his face until he looks up again. They both smile, and she gestures him to follow before vanishing into the shadows.

Spike gives Oz one last glance before following her.

It is still late californian summer, but the trees near the school building are already dead, and when Oz takes a deep breath he can already smell the approaching winter. Not Californian winter, not Frosty the Snow Man winter, but something colder, darker. Something primal and powerful, like the smell of snow before an avalanche, cold in a way that makes his hair stand on end and his teeth lengthen.

Oz starts back towards his car, the dry leaves dancing in the wind like paper ballerinas, and although the night is warm, he is shivering.

Once inside the car he locks the doors, then closes his eyes and concentrates in reining his beast, pushing it back into the cage where it belonged. He can feel it, can feel the wolf try to surface, struggling against the defenses he has worked so hard to build.

"Just let go, Oz, let it be free," he hears Veruca say and when he looks up, there is one horrifying second when he could have sworn he sees her reflected in the rear view mirror, smiling through animal teeth as her blood flows sluggishly from the gash on her neck.

His fingers tremble so much that he can hardly fit the key to the ignition and when the car finally lurches into motion, he presses down the accelerator and doesn't slow down until he is well past the Welcome to Sunnydale sign.

The full moon shines brightly from the hollow sky and Oz wonders how fast he would have to drive to catch the first morning flight from LAX to England.


End file.
